Toronto's Andrea Bargnani will be seen in London.

On Monday David Stern, the NBA’s commissioner, announced that London would be hosting the first regular season games played on foreign soil. This is seen as a way of getting the NBA into new markets and increasing it’s appeal, similar to that of our own Premiership, which rakes in millions of pounds from foreign television deals. On the 4th and 5th of March 2011 the New Jersey Nets and the Toronto Raptors will play each other at the O2 Arena, which hosted a number of pre-season games in the last few years. Whilst the teams on offer aren’t the best (The Nets finished the 2009/10 season as the worst in basketball and the Raptors missed out on the post-season by a game) this is a great opportunity to watch the most famous basketball in the world over 2 nights.

The regular pre-season games have all sold out in the O2 Arena and they will be another chance for this to happen in early October when Kobe Bryant and his LA Lakers will take on the Timberwolves at the O2. Some tickets are still available for this event and are priced at £35 to £80. As for the two regular season games, they haven’t been released yet but if you want them you’ll have to be quick as they’re sure to sell out fast!

Commissioner Stern didn’t commit as to whether these regular season games would be an annual event but said that if the games in March went well then the league would be happy to commit to it in the run-up to the 2012 Olympics basketball tournament. He also spoke about the idea of having European franchises including one based in London. However, the logistics of such a team would mean that several around Europe would be needed before it could be a viable proposition.

The NBA isn’t the first US sport to try and branch out into the UK, the NFL (american football) will be holding it’s 4th straight regular season game at Wembley Stadium in late October when the San Francisco 49ers play the Denver Broncos. The NHL (ice hockey) also started it’s regular season in London in 2009 with a sell-out. One hopes that with all these new sports coming into the country that they are watched by as many people as possible, the worst thing that could happen to the country’s hopes of an NBA franchise would be for the O2 Arena to not sell out on the 4th and 5th of March. See you there!

Tags | Basketball, London, nba